


Gunsmoke

by venndaai



Category: Machineries of Empire Series - Yoon Ha Lee
Genre: F/F, Guilt, Pining, Possibly Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-11
Updated: 2019-02-11
Packaged: 2019-10-26 05:10:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,073
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17739617
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/venndaai/pseuds/venndaai
Summary: Miuzan has particular reason to be concerned with the changing of the calendar.





	Gunsmoke

**Author's Note:**

  * For [UrsulaKohl](https://archiveofourown.org/users/UrsulaKohl/gifts).



 

The Protector-General ruled from her ship, mostly. A mobile command center that commanded an empire, or at least the remnants of one. Miuzan was fine with this. Like a lot of space Kel- like, she suspected, the general herself- Miuzan felt uncomfortable when she stood in one place too long. Not that anywhere really stayed still. Each station and planet in the universe was rushing away or towards each other at unimaginable speeds per second. But it felt different, being on a moth. There was a tangible distinction between real and artificial gravity.

The Three Kestrals Three Suns rushed through space, carrying its cargo of fragile humans. Inesser’s role did not allow her to command the ship herself, except in combat situations, of which there had been few in the last few years. She did not spend her time in the ship’s command center, but in a well-appointed office on the same deck.

Miuzan, as the Protector-General’s aide, had her own desk in that same office. It was a very comfortable desk, and came with considerable perks. There was a drinks cabinet. There were paintings on the walls, diving hawks picked out in dizzying blues. There was an ornate antique clock.

She was currently trying to ignore the clock, but she kept reading the same line in the budget report over and over again, and at last she gave up, and let herself glance up. Out of the corner of her eye she saw Tseya, leaning over the general’s desk as the two of them looked over a document. Tseya did not seem aware of the clock’s existence. Miuzan stood up. When she left the office, she had a file in her hands, but no reason to be delivering it anywhere. It wasn’t until she reached the command center and saw how still everyone was sitting in there, how they were all watching the main display, that she realized she simply needed to be around other Kel.

Other Kel, she thought, embarrassed, guilty, confusedly shamed, who weren’t the general.

One of their seconded Nirai had done the calculation, without being asked, just sensing that it had to be done. He’d figured out the exact time that the ship would hit the wave of change sweeping the calendrical terrain that was Protectorate space.

Miuzan stood by the doors, conscious that she had no reason to be in the command center. But no one called attention to her lack of purpose. Colonel Iayza gave her a nod. Miuzan observed the room. Doctrine looked a little anxious, but not tense the way all the Kel were. As Kel-seconded Rahal, the Doctrine officers probably hadn’t used their factional ability since academy, anyway.

The sound of the doors opening behind her made Miuzan grip the railing in front of her with hands she was sure were white-knuckled under their black gloves. She heard footsteps behind her, felt bodies passing, caught a whiff of perfume. The Andan’s- rose and verbena- and then, much stronger, Inesser’s own scent, rose and leather and what she would swear was gunsmoke, bottled and combed into the general’s blue-tipped hair, so that every movement of her head made Miuzan close her eyes and feel sick.

“I know this is difficult,” the general said, behind Miuzan, quiet but pitched so that everyone in the room could hear. “I know it was unfair of me to make this decision on your behalf. I am Kel. I understand your feelings.”

Miuzan hated that she found herself wondering if the general did understand, really. It had been nearly a decade since Inessor had risen to the very tip of the hierarchy. It must have been a very long time since she felt the guiding force of compelled obedience. Formation instinct was more than just that, of course, and Inessor must still feel the instinctive trust in one’s fellows, and the longing for immolation.

And, of course, the taboo.

The general didn’t say anything more. Someone focused the main screen on the countdown, and Miuzan watched the numbers change, and then closed her eyes, and watched them on the insides of her eyelids.

_Three, two, one…_

She half expected some invisible force to knock her off her feet, and tightened her grip on the railing in anticipation, but there was nothing. For a moment there was only silence, in her head, the sudden absence of the countdown, the lifting of dread now that the dreaded thing had arrived. Slowly, Miuzan opened her eyes. She turned her head.

Inessor was staring straight ahead. Tseya was murmuring something in her ear, and Miuzan felt the old tightness in her stomach at that. She put it aside, gazed at Inessor, at the clear cold gaze, the profile cut from stone or steel, the fall of dark hair shading into blue. Her heart thudded, her stomach twisted; but the gut-churning nausea never hit.

Miuzan forced herself to look away. She felt her face heating.

Perhaps, she thought, it would wither away on its own now, naturally, this traitorous thing, the hero-worship of her youth that had transformed into something sick when she had finally achieved a place in the presence of the object of her admiration. Perhaps the sickness had been sustained through the decades by the taboo itself, her disgust only feeding the obsession, and it was now free to run its course at last. Perhaps it would leave her now.

But she found she did not want it to.

Exactly as she had feared.

She sighed. Inesser heard, and turned to her. "Are you all right?"

"I'm fine," Miuzan said. It came out as a croak. _Just had the foundation of my life ripped out from under me, but I'm perfectly all right!_ That wasn't really fair- the Protectorate was still there, she still had her cause to fight for- but it was all different, too. What made her any different from Brezan now? What made her righteous, and him a fool? 

She swallowed. "It's fine," she said again, trying to convince herself. 

The general smiled at her. "I hope so," she said, softer than Miuzan had ever heard her, and it should have made her seem weaker but it didn't, nothing could, even now that Miuzan no longer thrilled to die at her command, even if now she seemed less an avatar of war itself and more- a human woman, still beautiful, still- Miuzan nodded. It would be fine. Somehow.


End file.
